Voters had mounting concerns, including over nuclear fears and the economic slowdown, as official campaigning began Tuesday for the Dec. 16 general election.

And one place where candidates, even their campaign posters, were conspicuously absent was a former high school in Kazo, Saitama Prefecture, which continues to house some 160 evacuees from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant meltdown disaster, which started in March last year.

Evacuees from the disaster, who number in the tens of thousands nationwide, said politicians have forgotten the hardships they have had to bear even as they make the future of the nation's nuclear power program a key campaign issue for the first time.